Last Friday’s jihadist assault on a Bangladeshi bakery resulting in the brutal deaths of at least 20 hostages and two police officers is the latest in a spate of lethal attacks commemorating the month-long Islamic holy season of Ramadan.

In their faith-based attack, the Islamist terrorists freed all the people who identified as Muslim and could prove it by reciting the Qur’an, while hacking to death the infidels present with machetes. Among the dead from Friday’s attack were nine Italians, seven Japanese, two Bangladeshis, one American and one Indian.

Just before Ramadan began, the Islamic State summoned Muslims to carry out terror attacks during what a group spokesman vowed would be “the month of conquest and jihad.”

A report issued by the U.S.-led Overseas Security Advisory Council warned that the ISIS threat could be credible because of the religious motivation to sacrifice oneself during this sacred time.

“According to Islamic practice, sacrifice during Ramadan can be considered more valuable than that made at other times, so a call to martyrdom during the month may hold a special allure to some,” the report stated.

Islam’s month of Ramadan began on June 5 this year and will finish on Tuesday evening. Muslims assert that it was during this month that Allah revealed the first verses of the Qur’an to Mohammed, on a night known as “The Night of Power.”

Since Ramadan began, jihadists have carried out targeted deadly attacks in Orlando, Afghanistan, Kenya, Lebanon, Istanbul, and now Bangladesh.

In the ISIS video calling for such attacks, spokesman Abu Mohammad al-Adnani urged Muslims to “get prepared, be ready … to make it a month of calamity everywhere for nonbelievers… especially for the fighters and supporters of the caliphate in Europe and America.”

Jihadist attacks during Ramadan are nothing new, and underscore the religious motivation for the carnage. During Ramadan 2015, for instance, Islamic jihadists carried out attacks in France, Syria, Kuwait, Syria, Somalia, and Tunisia.

Westerners are holding their collective breath as Muslims gear up for the final 24 hours of Ramadan 2016. A U.S. security expert is urging Americans to maintain vigilance during Monday’s Fourth of July celebrations.

The Independence Day holiday means that “there are attractive targets coming out during that period: You’ve got people getting together, you’ve got parades, you’ve got soft targets in [music] concerts,” explained Kyle Shideler, director of the Threat Information Office (TIO) at the Center for Security Policy.

The fact that there are “more potential targets” during the holiday makes it “attractive” to jihadists during Ramadan, he said.

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